Prisoner of War
by ohmicaiah
Summary: His strength is fading. He's all alone. And he doesn't even know when the war began.
1. Three Weeks

Absolutely everything was hurting. And it all hurt so fucking much.

Especially his head. Oh, fuck, his head.

He was pretty sure the bleeding had stopped. He could feel the sticky substance drying on his face, but he didn't dare attempt to check. They had to think he was still out cold from the blow he'd received, the one that was making his head pound so violently.

He'd been here for nearly three weeks now. Or had that mark been passed? No, he was pretty sure it was less than three. It wasn't _that_ hard to keep track of time here. His captors had a routine that helped him count the days.

They'd leave in the morning, when light was just beginning to come into the large warehouse through the small windows at the top of the wall. Since he was chained against the wall, hands too far apart to attempt to free himself, they left him alone. He took these hours to sleep.

They would come back in the evening, when the warehouse was beginning to grow dark and he'd gotten enough rest to glare at them as they entered. Unless he'd had trouble falling asleep and his eyes were still closed, in which case they would wake him up.

That was when they started the interrogating.

Most of the questions he honestly couldn't answer, but he never gave that away. He talked back with the sharp tongue he'd developed through years of working for the military. Not that one usually gained a sharp tongue from it, but he had. And it helped him to keep from letting the answers he could give from slipping out.

It was always just a matter of time before they started beating him.

Usually their bare hands were sufficient weapons. The slapped him across the face, punched his stomach, tore his hair out, bent his fingers at impossible angles. One of those fingers had snapped, just the other day.

Sometimes, they used provisions stocked up in the warehouse. Pocket knives slashed across his leg, his arm, his face. Old food was shoved down his throat in too large amounts, causing him to throw up violently. Gauze was wrapped around his throat, choking him until he was on the verge of passing out.

But they hadn't ever let him pass out until today. They couldn't ask questions when he was out cold.

They must be getting sick of him.

Once he'd gotten used to the pain in his throbbing head, he twitched his muscles one by one to take stock of the other injuries he'd received from the metal pipe he'd been beaten with today. Nothing other than a few cuts and bruises. They'd gone easy on him today.

He slowly opened his eyes, focusing immediately on the other end of the room where his captors sat, talking and snickering and sharpening their knives. They had a fire going. It was still night, so he hadn't been out for too long. Might as well let them know that. He shook one of his hands, the chain that held it away from his other rattling noisily with the motion.

The men's attention had been grabbed. Pigface was the first to stare at him with his beady eyes, a wide grin appearing under his snout. He deserved the nickname. The other men also looked, just not as quickly.

"Sleep well, boy?" Pigface asked, standing from his seat in the circle around the fire.

"Yeah, thanks for the blanket," he responded sarcastically, smirking weakly. Even such a slight movement strained at the wound he'd received earlier on his forehead, but he didn't show his pain. His agonizing pain...

Pigface laughed, motioning for a couple of his men to get up. Frogbreath and Snake were his choices today. He wasn't sure which was worse, the putrid breath or the piercing stare, but neither were hard to snap back at.

"Up for a little bit of conversation?" the beady-eyed leader of the group asked as he started across the room toward his captive.

"I could use some social interaction," he said, shrugging as well as he could when his arms couldn't move very far. "Gimme your best shot."

Frogbreath was starting it off tonight, getting right up in his face with an open mouth. He tried not to gag at the horrid smell.

"Let's start with your favorite subject," he said in a low voice, "The Philosopher's Stone."

He felt his face change at the mention of the Stone. He didn't want it to change, that's how they knew he had information about it. But it changed anyway. With that smell being stabbed into his nostril's, though, he didn't worry about it too much. He was too busy weighing the pros and cons of puking all over Frogbreath right then and there.

He wasn't even aware of the fact that he was being asked any questions.

Not until Pigface cut in, much earlier than usual. The man grabbed a knife from Snake's pocket, pushed Frogbreath out of his way, and held the blade of cold steel against his captive's throat.

His eyes widened in surprise.

"You better start talking soon, dammit!" Anger filled every crevice of every word. Strong anger. Hateful anger. Venomous anger.

Anger that could push even a sane man to murder.

And Pigface was hardly sane.

"If you keep this up much longer, boy, I'll fucking kill you."

_Kill._

Edward Elric's eyes widened considerably as the word echoed throughout his mind.

Death.

His fear of it washed through him as images of all those past experiences flashed one after the other through his mind.

No, he couldn't die yet. Al, Winry, Pinako, Rose, Havoc, Riza, Fuery, Breda, Falman.

Hughes. Elysia. Gracia.

Even Roy, who he hated with every cell in his vertically challenged body.

There were too many people to leave behind, too many people to live for.

But this demon Pigface was pushing too tightly against his throat.

"Alchemists are a dime a dozen," the man hissed, "I'll do it."


	2. Missed Meal

They'd finally stopped. The cutting was over. He wanted to badly to cover his neck with his hands and protect it from any further harm, but the chains were as tight as ever.

They'd had him _begging_, for fuck's sake.

Trying to calm himself down, Ed concentrated on feeling a trail of blood flow down from one of the cuts on his neck. One of the many cuts on his neck, fresh and stinging and bleeding.

They'd pierced his flesh over and over and over again as they asked their questions, the same questions as always, and all he could respond with was hysterical pleas for them to spare his life. He'd take anything but death, he'd said. Anything.

Snake had been so close to that artery. Pigface had outlined his trachea, mere millimeters away from puncturing the tunnel his breath ran through. They'd gotten so close, but none of those cuts would do anything to him besides bleed a little and then leave a scar. Some would even fade away completely.

He closed his amber eyes tightly against the tears threatening to spill from them. How embarrassing that had been, begging for his life like some sort of coward.

At least he hadn't given any information away.

Satisfied with this fact and thoroughly exhausted, he got into the most comfortable position he could manage with his legs bound and his arms chained above him. He needed to escape for a while.

Maybe he could see Al tonight...

--

_"Alchemists are a dime a dozen..."_

He woke with a gasp, moving to clutch at his throat, but the chains cut into his human wrist long before either hand reached its destination.

He gritted his teeth as that shock brought back all of the pain in his body. The sting of the dirty cuts on his throat. The throbbing of the gash in his forehead. The break in his ring finger. The ache of his shoulders, the sting of his chafed ankle. His hunger.

He looked across the room to find that his captors were nowhere to be found. He hadn't realized it was morning until that moment. He'd slept straight through breakfast, his only meal of the day, given to him just before they left each morning.

Ed frowned deeply and looked down at his bared stomach, past the bruises and the cuts. His muscles had faded a while ago, and his ribs were beginning to show as his body took the calories he wasn't receiving from food from what his body had stored.

Every scrap of food was important. And he'd missed his one meal of the day.

He looked up at his hands then, tugging on the chains experimentally. They were never any looser from the moment before, the day before, the week before. But he had to get himself out. Soon enough he'd be dead or he'd let something slip, making himself a traitor to Amestris. Neither of these options were acceptable. He had to get out.

He strained harder with his automail arm, his more resilient arm, ignoring the pain it caused in his chest and shoulder. He pulled and tugged and shook and tried everything he could in his current state to loosen the wall's hold on the hook that held the chain. His attempts grew frantic after just a few minutes.

He had to get the hell out of here.

They were going to kill him.

He was going to die.

"They're gonna _kill me,_ dammit!" he screamed at the chain, voice hoarse but still loud in the large room, "Let me go!"

Another moment of struggling passed, and he let his arm fall limp, only supported by the chain tied tightly around his metal wrist. He slumped back against the wall as a small sob escaped his lips. Three weeks tomorrow. Why had no one come looking for him yet? Al and Winry had to be worried, and that bastard Colonel had to miss having someone to do all the dirty work for him.

He turned his head, attempting to wipe his tears away against his flesh arm. It wasn't very effective.

He heard the first of his tears hit the cold, hard floor, and he broke.

He pulled himself into the smallest ball he could manage, hiding his face in his knees, sobbing violently and painfully as tears flowed freely now from his dulling eyes.

He was going to die here, all alone.

He was never going to see anyone he cared for ever again.

Alphonse. Winry. Pinako. Riza, Havoc. Falman, Breda, Fuery. Gracia, Elysia, Russel, Fletcher, Scheska, Rosa, Mustang.

Yeah, Mustang. In this moment of weakness he could admit to himself that he did kind of care for the bastard.

But even that bastard hadn't found him yet. He was stuck here, full of pain, sentenced to death, and no one had come for him in the time he'd been here.

Maybe... Maybe they'd given up on him.

The thought wrenched another bone-wracking sob from his chest, another physical pain. But it was nothing compared to the emotional pain that now blanketed him, squeezing his heart too much.

Maybe they weren't even trying. They weren't even going to be looking for him when he was killed.

_Killed._

Back to the thought of death. A vicious circle that never ended.

He eventually cried himself back to sleep, though the peace that accompanied slumber would not last long.


	3. Gagged

Ed had never known hunger. Not real hunger. Not the kind of hunger you only felt when you hadn't eaten in four days.

Frogbreath brought him a glass of water a day to make sure he could speak when they asked him questions, the same questions as they always asked him. They'd stopped cutting near his vital organs about halfway through the fourth week, deciding to try starving him instead. He couldn't focus during the interrogations leading up to the end of the fourth week, and his struggling against the chains that held him grew weaker each day. His skin was already so much closer to following his skeleton.

He watched them eating in their usual place across the large room on the morning of the fourth week mark. They were almost done, they would be leaving soon...

Pigface caught him staring. That hideous grin spread across his face and he stood, bringing his plate of food with him.

Ed recognized the glint in his captor's eye. This teasing had happened the first day they hadn't fed him. He wasn't letting that grin stay on his face this time.

"Hungry, boy?" Pigface asked, crouching to his captive's level and waving the plate of food he held under Ed's nose. "All this food... You want some of it, don't you?"

"I don't take pity food," he rasped in response, throat dry.

"Think of it as a reward," Pigface said, picking up a piece of meat from the plate. "Answer our questions and we'll give you breakfast." He popped the meat into his mouth, chewing dramatically.

"I'll-" He had to clear his throat before continuing, though it was painful. He hadn't had any water since before the previous night's questions. "I'll never tell."

"Then starve to death."

"No!" he yelled.

He lunged forward, latching onto the plate with his mouth and trying to wrench it out of Pigface's grasp. The man pushed against his face to get him to let go.

And he bit him.

The man's cry of pain filled his ears as blood seeped into his mouth. Still, he didn't let go of Pigface's thumb until Snake ran over and yanked him off by the hair, continuing the motion until the boy's head slammed into the wall behind him.

He was plunged into darkness.

--

"Ah, the boy's awake."

Of course he was awake. His head hurt like hell.

Not that he could say so with a gag in his mouth.

Snake laughed his low, hissing laugh. "No more biting for you, boy."

He turned his gaze to glare venomously.

"Oh, don't give me that." A short pause, and then he explained, "Not only do you get a gag, but you get someone to keep you company while the boss is gone."

That's when Ed realized that Snake was, in fact, the only other person in the warehouse. So they'd left a guard today. Not that he had enough strength left to struggle, anyways.

Or maybe this guy would let him try.

He tugged on the chain holding his automail arm. Yesterday and the day before, it had moved a little more than it usually had, though his latest attempts had all been fairly weak.

Snake didn't seem to notice the excess movement, though. He just laughed.

"You really think that's going to work, boy? He hissed, "In your state, it won't budge at all."

Ed tugged harder ignoring the pain it caused all over his slowly weakening body. He had to get out. He had to get out...!

A knife pressed against his throat.

"Now, now, boy, we don't want you hurting yourself," Snake said, voice a menacing whisper, "Not before your special treat tonight."

Special treat?

Oh fuck, they were going to kill him.

Ed's eyes grew moist as his fear of death attacked him yet again. The knife pulled away from his skin and he let his head hang in defeat.

"That's better," the man said, shutting the pocket knife, "Have a little patience. The boss should be here soon with your present.

No more words were spoken.

Ed sat limply, eyes closed, but unable to sleep through his pain, hunger, and fear. There was no chance of him getting our now that they'd have someone on guard duty all the time. He was going to die here, simple as that.

He was slow to look up when the warehouse door opened, and he couldn't muster enough anger to glare. There was too much fear, too much pain...

"We got it," Frogbreath announced, pulling something from the bag that was over his shoulder and tossing it over to Snake.

The man caught it and smiled widely, holding the object in plain view for everyone to see.

Ed's eyes widened as he stared at the gun, all hope of escaping dissipating.


	4. Shot

Oh shit, they really were going to kill him. Today, apparently. With the gun that Snake was holding not even two feet away from him.

And those men were just talking. Talking like they weren't just about to kill an innocent young man.

He wouldn't even live to be eighteen, and his birthday was in just a couple of weeks. He couldn't die. All those people, all those years he would be leaving behind...

Suddenly, he was slapped across the face.

"Listen when I talk to you, boy!"

Ed had been too busy panicking to realize that Pigface was talking to him. The stinging in his cheek helped him to focus now.

Snake wasn't holding the gun anymore. Pigface had it, and was also alone with Ed now on his side of the warehouse.

"Are you listening now?" he asked, voice level.

Ed nodded weakly, panic still evident in his otherwise dull eyes.

"Good, 'cause this might be the last time you ever hear anyone talk."

He swallowed hard, even though it was uncomfortable due to the gag in his mouth and the dryness of his throat.

"You only gotta answer one question to live another day. That's how it's gonna work. We go until you answer all our questions, in which case we'll let you go, or until you refuse to answer a question, in which case we kill you." Pigface held up the gun and smiled wickedly. "Understand?"

It was a moment before Ed nodded. One question a day. Life or death. Simple, equivalent exchange. An answer for a day of life.

Pigface reached behind Ed's head, untying the gag in his mouth and taking it off. "I'm gonna give you an easy one tonight since I'm feeling so damn kind. Can you talk?"

"Uh-" The noise came, raspy and quiet, out of his throat. He shook his head.

"Water," Pigface called to the other side of the room. Frogbreath came over moments later with a cup of the liquid that was keeping Ed alive. After pouring it into the boy's mouth, he returned to the other end of the warehouse.

"All right." Pigface loosened his grip on the gun, holding it a bit more casually. "Before we start this, I need to know where I can find another alchemist in case I have to kill you. Name one for me."

Ed was stubbornly silent. There was no way he was going to let another alchemist go through all the shit he had.

A few moments of expectant silence went by. "What, you a lone wolf or something? I thought you were in the military." The horrendous-faced man cocked the gun. "You gotta be able to name a few for me, you're a smart kid."

The blond bit his cheek and stared at the gun. He couldn't be _killed_ over this question, could he? The man needed an answer or things couldn't go forward.

Amber eyes locked with muddy brown, challenging.

"All right, then."

The gun flashed with movement and a shot filled Ed's ears as a bullet buried itself in his human foot. Tears stung his eyes as he let out a loud, inhuman cry of pain.

"Tell me," Pigface demanded in an even tone once the boy had fallen silent.

"C-Colonel Roy... Roy Mustang," he stammered weakly, his eyes shut tightly to hold back tears of pain.

"Colonel, huh?" He tapped the gun against his chin thoughtfully. "Capturing a higher-up could be fun. But back to business, I haven't asked you the question of the day yet."

Oh fuck, he was right. The pain in his foot was keeping Ed from thinking straight.

He opened his eyes, a tear escaping and slipping down his cheek as he looked down at the bullet hole in his foot. It was bleeding, of course, making a puddle around his toes. Bones had most likely been broken judging by the position of the wound, and the bullet was probably still in his flesh.

His analysis was interrupted when the gun was pressed against his forehead, pushing his head back against the wall so he could look at Pigface again.

"This is an easy question, remember," the man said, "Tell me one thing I need for the Philosopher's Stone."

These guys weren't alchemists, why did they want the Stone, anyways? Maybe they were working for an alchemist...

_Click._

"Human sacrifices," he burst, scared from his silence by the cocking of the gun. He let out a breath of relief as the metal was pulled away from between his shaking eyebrows.

"Good boy," Pigface said, patting the tangled mess of gold hair on Ed's head before turning and crossing to the other side of the warehouse.

Edward curled himself up against the wall, placing his automail foot over his wounded flesh one as well as he could with bound ankles. The cool metal felt good against the heated wound. He closed his eyes, though tears still slipped through and fell down his cheeks.

He'd only answered two questions, but he'd put so many people in danger. He was still alive, but was it really worth it?

--

**AN:** I am so so SO sorry that it took this long to get this chapter up. I've had it written for forever and I just didn't type it up until tonight. The next chapter has already been started and I think I can write a good deal of it (if not all of it) tomorrow, and hopefully it will be up soon. Thank you to everyone for the reviews, alerts and favorites!


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